Just having a vague notion to travel and see the world won't get you far. You need to firm up those ideas and form a plan - if you don't you'll never leave! Many people will say that they always wanted to travel but never had the opportunity. In reality many of these people never created that opportunity; there is a subtle difference. Looking into the details, getting a firm plan and then telling people what you are going to do are a good way to begin.
FOR MAKE A ATTRACTIVE AND ADVENTUROUS TRIP THE YOU HAVE TO GET SOME INSPIRATION ABOUT TRAVEL.
Where to find inspiration? Read, research your ideas, think about where you want to go. You can take inspiration from :
Travel Magazines - usually, glossy high impact brochures on destinations world wide, ranging from The National Geographic to the pullouts from the weekend papers; there is a lot of material around. The problem is that it's unlikely that your experiences will match those shown in the magazines. Why? In the case of the National Geographic their reporters are often researching one particular aspect of a subject, or a society, spend months getting to know the subject, take thousands of photos, and produce an article just a few thousand of words in length. They know the topic inside out, but have they experienced all the region has to offer ? On the other hand, glossy magazines often provide content supporting the lifestyles and types of holiday for which the magazine can push advertising. Hence the glossy magazines' emphasis on luxury. An article on backpacking is not going to support the cruise liner advertising on its opposite page.
TV Travel Shows - in my time I have seen some amazing TV shows - BBC TV's the Rough Guide Series (not to be confused with the travel guides of the same name) - was inspirational; a mix of footage, sensationalism, culture, music and facts blasted at high speed in the now defunct def2 format (I'm showing my age now). Michael Palin has inspired a generation of Round the World Travellers, though most don't try to do it in 80 days. The holiday shows, "wish you were here" and "holiday 2000's" are aimed at the short breaks mass market - and the mass market buyers only give themselves two weeks a year to enjoy themselves.Inspiration.
Where do you want to go? The world is huge, really huge. One life-time would never be enough to see it all, so get an idea of what you want to see and experience. You only have a limited amount of life - and probably a more limited amount of time and finance to travel. So what are you going to do with it? The first step is to decide what kind of journey you want to go on. To do this you need inspiration.
Some people may be surprised to find that I don’t personally draw a lot of my travel ideas from online travel resources, but there are plenty of sites out there interested in helping people choose that perfect somewhere. (See examples of such sites here and here.)
So where does my travel inspiration come from? How do I decide where to travel? Here are five ways I find ideas for where I want to go next:
1. Music – you know that it is very odd that music inspires some of my travels. The truth is that I know nothing about music, and WE R terribly out of touch regarding what is mainstream and what the hip, underground music is at any given period of time.
But if you want to talk about an eclectic collection of music from around the world, then I’ve got it. My love of Celtic and Irish-inspired music have pushed Ireland to the top of my list of places to go. Seriously, does anyone else have the entire collection of albums by Clannad, not to mention several Celtic Christmas and other similarly Irish-inspired albums?
I’ve had a hankering for the Silk Road ever since I happened to run into the Silk Road Festival in Washington, DC, in 2001, where I had the chance to see Yo-Yo Ma and The Silk Road Ensemble perform. The haunting sounds of the festival have piqued my interest in the likes of Tajikistan and Mongolia ever since.
Over the years, I’ve managed to amass several CDs from the Rough Guide Music and Putumayo World Music collections, and my afternoon play list now includes local tunes from the Balkans, jazz from Africa, Peruvian flutes and didgeridoos from Australia. Every time I pop one in, I instantly want to pack my bags.
2. Pictures – The energy and vibrancy captured by good travel photography definitely gets me excited. I love pictures of natural settings and minimal people as well as bustling markets stacked with a rainbow of products. I also love photos of events—the Olympics, Carnival, the Fringe Festival—though the idea of actually dealing with the logistics of finding a place to stay and park so I can enjoy them can be daunting.
There’s something about the perfect photo of an isolated beach with the popping oranges and pinks of a sunset that really appeals to me. Or those vertigo-inducing, brilliantly green pictures of Machu Picchu that don’t appear to have any people in them; I’ve been there, and somehow all of my pictures ended up with people in them plus it was foggy and rainy.I know Stonehenge is surrounded by a highway and I’m aware that there’s not much on Easter Island besides moai, but I still want to go there because photographs draw me to to those destinations.
3. Similar Trips – If I’ve enjoyed one particular destination, I know that chances are high that I’m going to like another similar destinations. It’s almost always a sure bet that I’m going to find something I like about a U.S. national park just because of the nature of the destination. Sure, not everything lives up to its hype (even though I love popular parks like Yellowstone and Rocky Mountain, I couldn’t find it in my heart to fall in love with Yosemite), but there’s a sense of familiarity that really makes it easier to enjoy a new place faster.
I thoroughly enjoyed Switzerland, for example, so my desire to visit nearby France, Germany and Austria has greatly increased. I liked Honduras a lot, and my husband and I are toying with future trips to Guatemala and other Central American countries as a result. I fell in love with Australia while I was there, and, as a result, I’d like to check out New Zealand.
4. Research – When I was in middle school, I had to write a report on Cyprus, and I’ve been interested in visiting it ever since. Because I was so into Cyprus, I chose another island—Malta—for another report. I nearly visited the country while I was in college but didn’t quite make it. Nonetheless, both are high on my list of places I’ve got to visit.In my daily work, I frequently get to do research on places with which I’m not familiar. As I dig into the history and culture and begin to put together the bits and pieces that make a place special, my interest grows. For this reason, Morocco is one of my top choices for places to travel right now.
5. Books – such as travelling around Ireland with a fridge (who would have thought that this book would be a best seller. People do equally crazy things all the time, they just don't have the flare for humor that Tony Hawks is blessed with, nor do they skateboard as well), or Bill Bryson and his observations on tiny cultural habits and behavior, set in the grand scheme of road trips.I’ve mentioned before that I royally suck when it comes to trip planning so I’m not big on reading guidebooks for inspiration. I do enjoy books like Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel (read a review here), primarily for the pictures and interesting geographical tidbits, but I’m even more of a fan of fiction or narrative writing that puts me in a place with character.
Barbara Kingsolver’s The Poisonwood Bible has me intrigued by the Congo, and I absolutely love the imagery Paul Theroux painted in The Mosquito Coast. Well-written narratives have also left me with the desire not to visit certain places. Though I love Peter Hessler’s writing, it’s because of the honesty of it that I’m in no rush to get to China.
Travel Guides - any of the big name travel guides provide a wealth of information on a region. Browsing in a bookshop will often lead to an overwhelming choice. Try to look at a general book for a region, then decide if the region is for you. The advantages of this type of research are that you'll have a better idea of costs, places to stay and what the highlights are. See LonelyPlanet, Rough Guide, Fodors for further details. What about out-of-date travel guides ? Even older travel guides are useful, as the sites, the history, maps, the food, the culture of a place don't change so much over time. Even the older guide book's prices can be useful, since when you get a feel for how much costs have changed, you can work out up-to-date costs from the listed price in the old guide.
6.Websites - reading this document means that you have discovered one of the best sources for travel inspiration on the Internet. TravelBlog.org collects inspirational journals, stories and photos from thousands of users and displays them in an easy to read and attractive format. Surf through the locations, click the images, read sample journals, look at the highlights - there is a wealth of travel experience provided here. Lots of other sites exist on the net with a mass of information and detail on an different areas of the world, look at : wikipedia.org = more history information than you ever wanted to know, wikitravel.org = user created travel guides.
Be Adventurous!
Imagine yourself in the most adventurous places that you find on these searches for destinations. It's all hypothetical at this stage so go with it! Ignore the cost, imagine yourself on that tropical island, or visiting villages in remote African savanna. It will allow you to see what you really want to do!
BEST OF LUCK :)
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